Web Ink Now

Executive micro-management mentality

Here's one more installment in what has become (so far) a four part series about the silliness of implementing social media at companies.

The first three parts of this series are:
1) Advertising agency campaign mentality
2) PR agency pitch mentality
3) Ridiculous social media client mentality

This time we look at stereotypical behavior of senior executives when confronted with "that social media thing."

In my experience, there are three stages that many senior executives go through.

Initially, senior executives are ignorant of or simply ignore the potential benefits that social media and real-time marketing provide.

Then they start to hear bad things and then agree with the legal or HR people to ban participation.

Some time later, many executives have an epiphany and want to implement social media right now. The change typically comes because they read an article in Harvard Business Review or the Wall Street Journal. Or they feel a need to keep up with a peer company that is getting press for their real-time efforts.

EXECUTIVE MICRO-MANAGEMENT MENTALITY

• Executives ban what they don't understand. "Please issue the guideline banning Facebook and Twitter. And let's step up our Six Sigma and TQM efforts right away."
• Every executive has a social media horror story they read somewhere that they always tell when the subject comes up. "Yes, but the Kryptonite Lock example shows how much of a bad influence bloggers are!"
• Executives learned in MBA-school that the stock answer to any request is to ask for "Return On Investment." But if they see a need to do something, they do not hold themselves to the same ROI standard. "Before we can agree to the blogging thing, I need a detailed ROI calculation on how much it will benefit us. Oh, and by the way, I think we should give each of the 5,000 salespeople the latest version of Blackberry. It will only cost $2.5 million this year and my say so is your authorization to proceed. And fire up the G-IV, I have a golf game on Nantucket tomorrow and want to arrive tonight by 7:00."
• Executives listen too much to the lawyers and trust legal opinion when it comes to social media. I never understood this. What the heck does the average lawyer know about social media? No more than I know about the law but I would never advise an executive on a legal matter. "Okay. So if you review every tweet before it goes out, you legal guys are comfortable with us getting onto Twitter?"
• Executives listen to their peers more than their staff. "I was on the golf course and I heard about this Tweeter thing. Where's our Tweeter plan?"
• Executives think social media is just for the young. And they think the only qualification to get the company going is age. "My university-bound daughter is on Facebook. Let’s give her an internship this summer to get her to do our Facebook page."
• There is a competitive nature at play with many executives. "My golf buddy who is a CEO has a blog. I want you to make me one too. Can we have it done by Thursday?"
• Executives think going viral is easy. And they think humor is even easier. "Maybe we should put a clown in the video - that's always funny! How quickly can we get a million views on YouTube?"
• Executives insist on talking about the company's stupid products. "Love the video, but we need to get more copy from the Benford 5000 brochure into the middle section."
• Executives think they can do things on the cheap because social media is not real media. "Remember that Pepsi Super Bowl commercial? I want something like that, but don't spend more than $10k. Oh, and use an approved corporate vendor, like the video guy who tapes our town hall meetings"

How about it? Any more examples?

Image: Shutterstock / Helder Almeida

Ridiculous social media client mentality

I had fun writing my most recent two posts: Advertising agency campaign mentality and PR agency pitch mentality. Based on the large numbers of tweets and comments, the sweeping generalizations were interesting to many.

Joe Chernov suggested in a comment and a tweet that I also talk about clients. What fun! Thanks for the idea. Joe says: "I have to imagine that it's the needy, by-any-means-necessary, our-competitor-was-mentioned-we-weren't clients that are behind the wheel for most of these fender-benders."

In my experience, many companies want to throw money at "that social media thing." They frequently tap the agency they already use for public relations or for advertising work.

The client goes: "Hey, do you guys do social media work, too?"

The agency exec goes: "Yes, of course we do!"

This is exactly what leads to advertising agency campaign mentality and PR agency pitch mentality - an unqualified agency applying the skills of their trade to social media.

But hey, I get it. If you run an agency and a client has a few hundred grand to blow, why turn that down!

RIDICULOUS CLIENT MENTALITY

• The client insists that you talk up their stupid products. "Our products are the best in the industry. Bloggers will want to talk about them."
• The client must approve everything that you do. "We've gotta run the tweet by legal, HR, the CFO, and compliance. I can get the tweet approved in three weeks."
• Within the first week, the client becomes an instant social media expert. "We want to be just like Zappos. Just do what they are doing. Oh and those Blendtec videos are great. Let’s do something like that."
• Clients love gobbledygook. No matter how often you remove it, the crap keeps coming back during marathon approval rounds. "We focus on innovative solutions for new and improved, next generation, cost effective, world class, high performance, value added outcomes."
• Clients demand the impossible and then throw a hissy fit when you explain. "What do you mean we can’t get to number one on Google for the phrase 'iPhone application'?"
• Clients have branding guidelines from hell. "Can you make our tweets show up in PMS 2726 with Neue Helvetica fonts?"
• Clients hate spending any extra money. "Just do a Google Image search. I'm sure you can find a free photo of a slim man with grayish hair playing tennis in the rain. But the guy shouldn't look gay."
• Clients are cheap: "If you charge $20,000 a month retainer, can we just buy one day for $645?"
• Most clients don’t really know what they want. "We want to be hip in a California social media kind of way, but we’re a conservative British investment bank."
• Clients are vague: "The blog needs to look more professional."
• Clients never, ever operate in real time. "I don’t care if the blogger needs a comment now. I'm at lunch. Then I have a meeting. And tomorrow is booked solid. Maybe I can get to it Thursday."

Anyone got any more of these ridiculous client behaviors?

Inspiration from Clients from Hell.

Image: Shutterstock / Franck Boston

PR agency pitch mentality

Late last week I wrote a post called Advertising agency campaign mentality. It got some attention with, as of this writing, a few hundred tweets, a bunch of Facebook likes, and 24 comments.

Some people – including Chris Brogan and Dominic Litten called me out in this post because they saw it as a collection of clichés. Yep. Guilty.

While I stand by what I say and I certainly have seen a large number of ad agencies talking up their social media campaigns in the way that I talked about in my post --check out this one for example -- I will admit that my personal experience hiring agencies is from a decade ago. Sure, I did go a bit into the zone of cliché. But sometimes that's a great way to learn, right?

Every agency touts their expertise in social media. It doesn't matter if they are a PR agency, ad agency, design agency, or interactive agency—they’ve got you covered for that social media stuff.

"What's your budget again?"

So to be fair, I want to talk about the typical PR approach to social media too.

PR agencies are skilled at "pitching" reporters and editors in the hopes of getting a "hit" that they can add to their clip book.

(Interesting that the ad people use war metaphors but the PR people prefer baseball.)

So in my experience, their preferred approach to "that social media stuff" is to pitch bloggers too. I get more than 100 of these pitches a week: "Your blog readers will find our clients' stuff interesting! Oh, and we built them a Facebook page!"

PR APPROACH TO SOCIAL MEDIA - PITCH

• Relies on getting others to talk up clients. (We know all the key mommy bloggers!)


• The pitch is dripping with gobbledygook. (Our client has innovative, cutting-edge, mission-critical applications to improve business process!)


• The pitch prattles on about the client’s product or service. (Features! Benefits!)


• The pitch includes superlative laden quotes from third parties, such as customers, analysts, and experts. (Hey, don’t take our word for it – check this out.)


• The pitch usually includes "an invitation to speak with the CEO." (I always find it weird that only the CEO talks. What about offering up a customer of the client to talk about how they use the company's products or services?)


• Big budget. (Hey, we’re an expensive agency. You want the best, right? Want to see our Gold Quills and Silver Anvils?)

Just like when I talked about ad agencies, I know there are PR agencies out there who totally understand other ways to get their clients "some of that social media stuff" than just pitching bloggers and getting a few clips.

There are some excellent agencies that combine traditional media relations with content creation and social media.

I think the excellent PR agencies understand that they have a role in helping their clients to create original content that gets them noticed. That valuable online information -- YouTube videos, blogs, photographs, ebooks, Twitter feeds, Webinars, and the like – is a better approach in the long run than generating a handful of clips from bloggers.

What do you think?

Image: Shutterstock / Mark Herreid

Advertising agency campaign mentality

Back when I had a "real job" running marketing departments, I worked with a number of advertising agencies. They were constantly pitching me "campaign" ideas.

("We'd love to work with you, David. What's your budget?")

Advertising campaigns "target" a specific market within a fixed time period (note the war metaphors).

Over the past few months, I've noticed a large increase in the number of advertising people who have contacted me in the hopes that I would talk up the "social media campaign" that they developed for a client.

In particular, the ad agencies love to tell me about the contests and games they've created as part of the campaign. And frequently, the pitch they send me includes talk of some award they've won.

This got me to think about the advertising agency directed campaign approach social media.

ADVERTISING APPROACH TO SOCIAL MEDIA – A CAMPAIGN

• Big budget. (Hey, we’re an expensive agency. You want the best, right? Want to see our trophy case?)


• Often tied to a game or a contest. (People love games like FarmVille! We’re doing something like that.)


• Typically require buying attention. (We’ll drive people to the landing page via Google AdWords and Facebook ads).


• Created to appeal to the masses rather than a discrete buyer persona. (Everyone will want to play!)


• Relies on interrupting people to get them to pay attention to a message. (We’re ad people after all. We are good at interruption.)


• Typically one-way: company-to-consumer. (We want everyone to “like” us on Facebook. Not sure what they do after that.)


• Based on campaigns that have a limited life. (We’ll launch in three months and the campaign will be over in six months.)


• Creativity is deemed the most important component. (We’re an award winning creative agency! Want to see our trophy case?)


• It seems more important for the ad agency to win advertising awards than for the client to win new customers. (See above)

Now, don’t get me wrong. I'm not saying you should never do a campaign. I run campaigns myself, like when I have a new book out.

And I'm not saying that all advertising agencies should not be trusted with social media marketing. (Certainly the ones that practice digital masturbation shouldn't).

However, I think there is a huge difference between a sustained development to creating valuable information online -- YouTube videos, blogs, photographs, ebooks, Twitter feeds, Webinars, and the like -- vs. creating a one-off Facebook game in the hopes that people will "like" you.

For many companies, social media is a check box. Direct mail? Check. Tradeshows? Check. Magazine ads? Check. Social media? Check.

A great brand journalism approach to content creation is not a one-off campaign that allows you to check something off the list.

To be successful, you need to hire the right people. I suggest taking the money you would have spent with the ad people and giving it to journalists.

What do you think?

Image: Shutterstock / Jeffrey M. Frank

The social media alarm you hear in Australia is FEAR

People are naturally scared of that which they do not understand.

I noticed a great deal of fear about social media among executives attending my talks during my speaking tour of Australia over the past two weeks.

To give you a sense of what I heard, consider the Sydney Morning Herald story that ran while I was in Australia: Reputation wrecking: social media alarm sounds

The SMH story cites a research study of 446 major Australian corporations and public sector organisations by global consultancy firm Aon that says the number one concern raised in the Risk Management Benchmarking Survey was "brand and image" and social media was singled out as a key risk.

Huh? Social media are not a risk. They are an amazing opportunity to communicate! Social media only become risks for those organizations that do not participate.

Contrast that fear with how GM Holden has embraced social media as a fantastic way to reach customers. In my video interview with Andrea Matthews, she explained the benefits of Facebook and how she can now communicate with over 180,000 Holden fans via Facebook.

FEAR

Many company executives trace their worries about social media to their belief that "people will say bad things about our company" via social media.

They trot out the same dusty old examples to justify their fear such as the Kryptonite lock example cited in the SMH article, originally dating from 2004, as evidence that social media is somehow bad.

This fear leads them to ignore blogs and online forums and to prohibit employees from participating in social media. In every discussion that I've had with employees who freely participate in social media, I've confirmed that this fear is significantly overblown.

Sure, an occasional person might vent frustrations online, and now and then a dissatisfied customer might complain.

But the benefit of this kind of communication is that you can monitor in real-time what's being said and then respond appropriately. Employees, customers, and other stakeholders are talking about your organization anyway, so unless you are participating online, you’ll never know what’s being said at all.

The beauty of the Web is that you benefit from instant access to conversations you could never participate in before. And frequently you can turn around impressions by commenting on a "negative" post.

Banning what we don't understand

I’m always amused when company executives want to ban social media but are perfectly happy to arm employees with telephones, email addresses, and Blackberrys or iPhones.

Why not just ban the telephone at work?

We're in the midst of a communications revolution.

More than half the world's population has access to the Web, and a Google search returns posts from millions of blogs. 700 million people worldwide are on Facebook. There are billions of videos on YouTube.

Your customers want to communicate with you using social media. If your company doesn't adopt social media as tools, your competitors will -- and beat you out for business.

Creating a Social Media Monster

UPDATE - March 7, 2011 - Tynicka Battle from ThinkTank jumped in to comment and I want to thank her very much for doing so. Please be sure to read her comment (the 23rd one down).
++++++++

There is just one question to ask your prospective social media agency.
(Answer at the end of this post.)

Every agency touts their expertise in social media. It doesn't matter if they are a PR agency, ad agency, design agency, or interactive agency—they’ve got you covered for that social media stuff. "What's your budget again?"

This morning I received an email pitch from Len Stein of Visibility Public Relation (sic).

The email subject line is "Creating a Social Media Monster - Lady Gaga and agency Think Tank Digital." The email pitch tells me all about how "ThinkTank Digital was the agency behind [Lady Gaga’s] runaway success."

Wow! How amazing is that! I want me some of that success!!!

I find it fascinating that "Lady Gaga's Digital Agency of Record" hired a public relations firm to pitch me about the agency's role in creating a superstar: "Throughout Think Tank's two-and-a-half year campaign for Lady Gaga, which concluded November 2010, the pop star evolved into the first true superstar of the digital age becoming the first online franchise to: reach one billion online video views, the most followed person on Twitter, and a top "Liked" person on Facebook."

Holy cow!! ThinkTank Digital must be amazing at social media. If they are responsible for a billion online video views and 8.5 million Twitter @LadyGaga followers for the pop superstar, imagine how they must do their own social media marketing!!!

- ThinkTank on Facebook? Couldn’t find them.
- ThinkTank blog? None listed that I could find.
- ThinkTank video channel? Didn’t seem to be one.
- @thinktankmktg on Twitter? 398 followers

(Let me know if I’m missing something here – I'm happy to correct if I am in error).

The email pitch gushes about ThinkTank Digital's partners Tynicka Battle and Amina Elshahawi: "Their timing was certainly right - Social media was emerging as a force when ThinkTank Digital, was established, January 2006, to provide cutting-edge social media, digital marketing, branding, publicity, and interactive promotions for leading, and emerging, music artists, motion pictures, and consumer brands. But the agency's success is the result of Tynicka and Amina's passion for digital marketing, intuition and tireless energy."

- Tynicka Batelle on Twitter? Blogging? Video channel? Couldn’t find her.

- Amina Elshahawi on Twitter? Blogging? Video channel? Couldn’t find her.

The tagline on the ThinkTank Digital site is: "Your Audience Lives Online. Does Your Brand?"

Good question. I'm glad you asked.

I've said it before and now say it again: There is just one question to ask your prospective social media agency.

Note: Am I being a little harsh about ThinkTank Digital? Sure. But their PR agency pitched me the story! I'm just writing it as I see it. Thanks for the pitch.

Playing by the rules

Yesterday was a snow day in much of the USA.

My daughter's school was closed because the superintendent decided it was too dangerous to have the students come to class.

What about companies?

Many companies fretted about staying open or closing for the day. I've heard from friends whose companies failed to call a "snow day" yesterday and caused people to be stranded on the highway trying to get to work. Others closed the office needlessly because road conditions were not so bad that people could not get into work.

What a stupid process

Why not empower employees to make their own decisions about getting to work? When people control their own behavior, they can say: "Hey the snow is awful, I am working from home today." Or they can say: "It seems okay, I'm gonna go into work."

When companies establish rules and policies on things like snow (or social media), they are treating employees in the same way that schools treat children.

If your company employs adults, you need to treat them like adults.

One reason why good people who work at companies with a command and control mentality get frustrated is that they lose control of their own decision making power. The not so good tend to study the policy and do the minimum to satisfy the rules.

Eliminating rules at HubSpot

HubSpot, a company I admire, take the "treat employees as adults" mantra seriously.

"Because we started in the post-Internet age with people who live and breathe the Web, we run the business in a unique way," says Brian Halligan, co-founder and CEO of HubSpot. "Instead of command and control, we empower people at the edges, and that changes the way you hire, promote, the hierarchy, and so on. We have a very different sense of trust and autonomy than most companies. And it has big importance for leadership."

Since Brian runs HubSpot as an always-on, real-time enterprise, the lines between "work" and "private time" blur to the point that the vacation policy was eliminated—people just take time off when they need it.

"In my father's era, people worked 9-to-6 every day in an office," Brian says. "It was very structured, and he had to be in the office to get the work done. But our people have iPhones, and they are always online even on the weekends. It seemed very silly to us that people who sometimes worked for a few hours at home on a Sunday needed to formally request time off on a weekday. It just seems ludicrous to have this whole vacation policy so we said, 'Take whatever vacation you want; we trust you.' It's not command and control. Instead, it’s very much about trusting and autonomy and pushing the decisions down so people can react in a real-time way."

What about abuse of trust?

When I talk about eliminating rules such as vacation policies and social media restrictions, people always ask about violation of trust. What happens when people take too much time off for example?

Simple. Fire their sorry ass. (You can give them a warning the first time if you want). The rest of the team already knows they are slackers anyway and will applaud your decision.

+++++++
UPDATE February 3, 2011 at 11:12 am -- Brian just sent me the actual HubSpot snow policy. Click the image to enlarge. It is three words: "Use Common Sense."

Image: Shutterstock / Zurijeta

Disclosure: I am "Marketer in Residence" at HubSpot.

Becoming a change agent

Becoming a change agent at your company or with your clients is tough. There is always risk when you challenge the entrenched status quo.

But the rewards for being a recognized pioneer can be tremendous.

We are going through a communications revolution no different than when the telephone first entered the workplace a century ago.

Many people tell me that they have bosses who are just plain resistant to change. Or fearful. Or stubborn. Or all three.

Or it's the PR department, the HR people, or the lawyers who say "no".

Amazingly, a huge number of companies still block employee access to social networking sites like Facebook, YouTube and Twitter.

That's crazy. Imagine blocking the telephone? Or the fax machine? Or email?

If you work for a company that is not engaging its marketplace in the ways that buyers demand, I think you have three choices:

1. You can become a change agent.

This is difficult but potentially very rewarding. The role of change agent comes with risks because the entrenched powers will fight you.

In 2002, I was fired from my job as VP of Marketing at a division of the Thomson Corporation partly because I was a vocal advocate for new marketing in a business that was in love with direct mail and tradeshows.

While you risk getting sacked, if you successfully bring a company into the world of modern communications, you have potential to be promoted, get a raise, and become a hero.

2. You can live with the status quo.

There's nothing inherently wrong with living with what others tell you to do and not challenging what you know to be wrong. When you’ve got a family and obligations, particularly in a tough economy, putting your livelihood at risk may not be the right thing. But you will take an emotional toll.

Can you live with yourself if you're ducking into the restroom to hide in a stall with a mobile so you can update your social sites?

3. You may want to find another job.

I know people who have decided to leave companies solely because of the draconian social networking policies. They choose to leave a company where they have friends, have worked for years, and whose products they love.

In a particularly radical move, I know some who have quit without another job lined up. Many of those people have started their own thing and most have succeeded.

You've got a choice.

You can become an agent of change. The rewards can be great, but so are the risks.

Image: Shutterstock / grafvision

Not all music artists are big fat lip-synching social media babies

A few weeks ago I spoke at the San Francisco MusicTech Summit, an event that brings together smart people at the intersection of music and technology.

I spoke on a panel called Engaging Your Community. And later in the day I sat in the Artists Panel to see what they had to say.

I was amazed at how utterly different the discussions about social media were at these two panels. The artists were so resistant. In fact, I asked a question of the artists, which began: "With respect, the vibe here is of a bunch of big babies..."

It seemed to me that the artists pined for the good old days where radio, Billboard Magazine, major labels, and CDs were the rule and "stealing music" on the Web wasn't yet a pain in the ass.

I got news for artists. We're not going back to the good old days.

But why complain in the first place? My gosh, for the first time in history it is easy to reach fans. My sense is that artists are okay with that. But many of the artists I spoke with with were so damned egotistical. The fact that fans can reach them is an issue!

I was amazed that many on the artist panel advocated ghost written social media entries. Well, okay. They must lip-synch at their live shows.

As I looked around the standing-room and sitting-on-the floor only audience, my sense was that many were not agreeing with these artists.

In a stunning twist, the entire Summit is available for free audio download on Archive.org. It's amazing to me that what so many artists hate (free downloads) are exactly what they want in an event like this! Kudos to Brian Zisk, Summit Executive Producer, for making the content available.

Engaging Your Community

My panel included:
Meredith Chin - Facebook
David Meerman Scott – Marketing Strategist
Mike More - Headliner.fm
Chris Vinson - Bandzoogle
Moderator: Brenden Mulligan – Sonicbids

We talked about what an exciting time it is to be an artists. Now you can reach fans directly. Full audio of the Engaging Your Community panel is available.

Here is a video I did with Meredith Chin about how artists can use Facebook to build a fan base. Meredith works with many artists. She cites Joe Purdy and Javier Dunn as two non-superstar artists who have done a good job on Facebook.

Joe and Javier are not big fat lip-synching social media babies.

See? Artists like Joe Purdy and Javier Dunn engage with fans.

The big babies speak

The artist panel included:

Del The Funky Homosapien - Hip Hop Artist
Evan Lowenstein - Evan and Jaron / StageIt
Raul Malo - Recording Artist
Dan Lebowitz - Animal Liberation Orchestra (ALO)
Moderator: Tamara Conniff - The Comet

Full audio of the Artist Panel is available.

The tone was set for the panel by the moderator, Tamara Conniff, who was formerly the chief editor of Billboard. Her first question was: "What's too much? The artist used to be shrouded in mystery. But some of that has been lost with too much engagement in social media. How do you keep the artist to fan romance alive."

I reject the entire question! But I wasn't on the panel, so I couldn't say that.

This is the sort of big media "woe is us" kind of question that people who worked at a place like Billboard ask about social media. All this pesky interaction! All those bloggers who are not real journalists! All the time it takes to be on Twitter!

The recurring theme on the panel was: "Who cares what I had for breakfast." This lament came up so often from the big babies.

Most of the artists seemed to miss the point that social media is much more than Twitter and breakfast. Now you can reach your fans directly without your label babysitting you!! Facebook, YouTube, and blogs and other forms of media are good, aren’t they?

Lip-synching your way into social media

I was disappointed that many on the panel advocate that artists use third party people and companies to handle social media. Ugh.

Isn't ghost writing your Twitter feed the same as lip-synching at your live show?

Here are some choice (paraphrased) comments I wrote down:

Dan Lebowitz (Lebo) - Animal Liberation Orchestra (ALO)

I want to focus on writing music. I could spend my entire week on social media.

Raul Malo – solo artist.

Social media has opened up some negatives. There should be a certain mystery. I don’t want to know everything that my wife does. There should be a fine line. An artist should communicate through the music and the live show. We need to maintain a balance.

Del The Funky Homosapien

You need other people to handle things like Twitter.

Evan Lowenstein - Evan and Jaron / StageIt

We need to pull back like Colonel Tom Parker did with Elvis and help the artist leave the audience wanting more. There is a romance that needs to be between fans and the artist. Getting too close can make the romance sour. Artists should not be talking about the weather. We create experiences for fans.

I ask my question at 48:20 – With respect, the vibe here is a bunch of big babies. Since 1995 we have the Web to communicate. There are three billion people on the Web and a half a billion on Facebook alone. Do you listen to people?

Got a few whoops from the audience. The answers were interesting.

Special commentary for any artists reading this

I had some side conversations with artists who said: "You don’t understand!"

Oh, but I do.

We're in the same fundamental business, you music artists and me. We make our living in the exact same way. You create content and do live gigs for a living. I create content and do live gigs for a living.

You create music content and choose to self-publish or publish with indie or major labels.
I create text content and choose to self-publish or publish with indie or major publishers.

You can choose to open your music up and make it free (or clamp down and say "no").
I can choose to open my content up and make it free (or clamp down and say "no").

You can tour and play your music live.
I can tour and give live speeches.

You can choose to engage your fans in social media (or not).
I can choose to engage in social media (or not).

By the way, that crap about Twitter and breakfast? Amanda Palmer made $11,000 on Twitter in 2 hours.

Amanda Palmer is not a big fat lip-synching social media baby.

We're lucky to be able to engage. Why does it seem such a problem?

Bonus for Grateful Dead fans

At the Summit, I connected with my friend Jay Blakesberg who did the photos for my book with Brian Halligan Marketing Lessons from the Grateful Dead.

I also met Betty Cantor, the Dead's live recording engineer for many years (of "Betty Board" fame). It was a particular thrill to meet John Meyer, CEO of Meyer Sound Laboratories, who worked on the Dead's stunning live sound system during the band's heyday. Here I am with John (who is holding our book).

PS > If you are an artist, you must read Bob Lefsetz, the best music writer on the planet.

PR spam about cards that make clouds move faster for pilots I think

I get dozens of unsolicited press releases and pitches from PR people via email each week. They want me to write about them in this blog, or the Huffington Post, or EContent Magazine, or a one of my books.

OK, fine. If the release or pitch has something to do with what I write about I'm cool.

But it is the nonsense from companies (usually sent by PR agencies) that have absolutely no relationship to what I write about that cross the line to become spam.

To paraphrase the Wikipedia entry, spam is sending email that is both unsolicited by the recipient and sent in substantively identical form to many recipients.

Take this release, which I received a few minutes ago via email, as an example.

I have no clue what this is about and no interest whatsoever in it. I didn't ask to receive this company's information.

Headline
Vello Systems Introduces Industry's Lowest Latency, Highest Density, Multi-Service 10G Solution
Huh? Sorry, I have no clue what this gobbledygook means.

Sub-head
New Sub-5 Nanosecond CX Family Service Card Raises Bar for 10G Performance and Density; Purpose-Built for Latency-Sensitive Financial Computing and Distributed Storage Applications
I'm still confused. Very, very confused. A card?

Brag line
Vello Systems, a leader in high performance cloud infrastructure solutions…
Clouds! I know what they are. Those white things in the sky. And I am aware of this notion of "cloud" relating to computing. I think "cloud" can be abbreviated as "SaaS". Or SaaS means cloud. Or something like that.

The news
…announces the introduction and availability of its ultra-low latency, high-density, 10G CX50T service card.
Yep, it is a card! I have credit cards in my wallet. Playing cards are fun too.

Body of release
Read it here
WTF?

About Vello Systems
Vello Systems develops advanced ultra-low latency, multi-terabit, cloud infrastructure systems and solutions for service providers, enterprise and government institutions worldwide. Its CX Family™ of systems and patented Cloud Switching technology are purpose-built to make the Cloud faster, more agile, and above all more economical. Vello Systems is headquartered in Menlo Park, CA.

Now I get it. They make clouds move faster with some special cards. I bet pilots love this product. Hopefully they pitched Flying Magazine with this awesome news.

Okay, I've had my fun. I've written about Vello Systems. (Isn't that what they wanted). Sorry to pick on this company but this was the release I saw first when thinking about this topic.

So what should you be doing to reach people like me effectively?

Here are some ways to be successful with the media:

Follow us so you know what we are interested in
> Read our blogs.
> Comment on our blogs.
> Read our books.
> Follow us on Twitter.
> Read our publications (or watch & listen to our TV & radio shows).
> Attend our speaking gigs.

Pitch us in the areas we write about
> Send well-crafted, personal email telling us something that is interesting and helpful in the area that we cover.
> Send us something in real-time when we are interested, not when you happen to have news.

Publish yourself and bypass the media
> Publish your own blog.
> Produce videos
> Tweet

Here is my single most essential PR pitching tip

Don't pitch your product.
Most journalists don't care about products.
Instead…
Tell us how your organization solves problems for customers.

Image: Shutterstock / Wolfgang Schaller